XPost: alt.fan.rush-limbaugh, alt.atheism, alt.global-warming   
   XPost: rec.arts.tv   
   From: mail-a-lonSg@hmn.com   
      
   Trump Administration Erases the Government's Power to Fight Climate Change   
      
   The Environmental Protection Agency repealed the bedrock scientific finding   
   that greenhouse gases threaten human life and well being. It means the   
   agency can no longer regulate them.   
   Listen to this article · 13:07 min Learn more   
      
   Large plumes of white smoke flow from two smokestacks that loom over a tree   
   lined street in a Kentucky town.   
   Rigorous scientific findings since 2009 have showed that greenhouse gases   
   and global warming are harming public health. Credit... Jeff Swensen/Getty   
   Images   
   Lisa Friedman   
      
   By Lisa Friedman   
      
   Reporting from Washington   
   Feb. 12, 2026Updated 3:39 p. m. ET   
      
   President Trump on Thursday announced he was erasing the scientific finding   
   that climate change endangers human health and the environment, ending the   
   federal government's legal authority to control the pollution that is   
   dangerously heating the planet.   
      
   The action is a key step in removing limits on carbon dioxide, methane and   
   four other greenhouse gases that scientists say are supercharging heat   
   waves, droughts, wildfires and other extreme weather.   
      
   Led by a president who refers to climate change as a "hoax, " the   
   administration is essentially saying that the vast majority of scientists   
   around the world are wrong and that a hotter planet is not the menace that   
   decades of research shows it to be.   
      
   It's a rejection of fact that had been accepted for decades by presidents   
   of both parties, including Richard Nixon, whose top adviser warned of the   
   dangers of climate change and the first President George Bush, who signed   
   an international climate treaty.   
      
   And it is a knockout punch in the yearslong fight by a small group of   
   conservative activists as well as oil, gas and coal interests to stop the   
   country from transitioning away from fossil fuels and toward solar, wind   
   and other nonpolluting energy.   
      
   "This is about as big as it gets, " President Trump said at the White House   
   as a smiling Lee Zeldin, the administrator of the Environmental Protection   
   Agency, stood by. "We are officially terminating the so-called   
   'endangerment finding, ' a disastrous Obama-era policy, " he said.   
      
   Mr. Trump called it a "radical rule" that became "the basis for the Green   
   New Scam, " a label the president gives to any effort to curb emissions or   
   develop renewable energy.   
      
   Mr. Zeldin called it "the single largest deregulatory action in the history   
   of the United States. " He accused Democrats of having launched an   
   "ideological crusade" on climate change that "strangled entire sectors of   
   the United States economy, " particularly the auto industry.   
      
   The administration claimed it would save auto manufacturers and other   
   businesses an estimated $1 trillion, although it has declined to explain   
   how it arrived at that estimate.   
   Editors' Picks   
   Momofuku Enters Its Dad Era With Super Peach   
   Cooking Fancy Isn't About Expensive Ingredients. It's a Mind-Set.   
   Who Cares if Matt Damon's 'Odyssey' Helmet Is Historically Accurate?   
      
   At issue is what's known as the endangerment finding, a 2009 scientific   
   conclusion that greenhouse gas emissions pose a danger to Americans' health   
   and welfare. The finding was based on more than 200 pages of research and   
   evidence.   
      
   Mr. Trump, who has called climate scientists "stupid people, " claimed on   
   Thursday that the finding "had no basis in fact"   
      
   For nearly 17 years, the E. P. A. had relied on the bedrock finding to   
   justify regulations that limit carbon dioxide, methane and other pollution   
   from oil and gas wells, tailpipes, smokestacks and other sources that burn   
   fossil fuels. By repealing the endangerment finding, the United States is   
   likely to emit up to 18 billion metric tons of additional emissions into   
   the atmosphere between now and 2055, according to the Environmental Defense   
   Fund, an advocacy group. That is about three times the amount of climate   
   pollution the country emitted last year.   
      
   The added pollution could lead to as many as 58,000 premature deaths and an   
   increase of 37 million asthma attacks between now and 2055, the group said.   
      
   But on Fox Business on Wednesday, Doug Burgum, the interior secretary,   
   revived a debunked myth to sum up how the Trump administration views carbon   
   dioxide, the main greenhouse gas. "CO2 was never a pollutant, " he said.   
   "When we breathe, we emit CO2. Plants need CO2 to survive and grow. They   
   thrive with more CO2. "   
      
   While carbon dioxide can help plants grow, the extraordinarily high levels   
   in the atmosphere are overwhelming natural processes and increasing the   
   frequency and severity of drought, heat waves and other damaging events,   
   according to scientists.   
      
   President Barack Obama wrote on social media that the repeal of the   
   endangerment finding means, "We'll be less safe, less healthy and less able   
   to fight climate change — all so the fossil fuel industry can make even   
   more money. "   
      
   Gov. Gavin Newsom of California promised a court challenge. "If this   
   reckless decision survives legal challenges, it will lead to more deadly   
   wildfires, more extreme heat deaths, more climate-driven floods and   
   droughts, and greater threats to communities nationwide, " he said.   
   California "will sue to challenge this illegal action" and will continue to   
   regulate greenhouse gases, he said.   
      
   "We will see them in court, and we will win, " said Manish Bapna, the   
   president of the Natural Resources Defense Council. "The science and the   
   law are crystal clear, and E. P. A. is issuing a rushed, sloppy and   
   unscientific determination that has no legal basis. "   
      
   In revoking the endangerment finding, the Trump administration made the   
   legal argument that the Clean Air Act allows the government to limit only   
   pollution that causes direct harm to Americans, and only in cases where the   
   damage is "near the source" of the pollution.   
      
   Greenhouse gases, however, collect in the atmosphere where they form a kind   
   of blanket around the Earth, trapping heat from the sun. That is altering   
   the Earth's climate and intensifying heat waves, drought, hurricanes and   
   floods while also melting glaciers, causing sea levels to rise.   
      
   The planet has warmed on average by about 1.4 degrees Celsius, or 2.5   
   degrees Fahrenheit, since the Industrial Age, according to Europe's   
   Copernicus Climate Change Service.   
      
   The action announced on Thursday eliminates limits on greenhouse gases   
   produced by motor vehicles. Transportation is the largest single source of   
   greenhouse gases in the United States. The Biden administration had sought   
   to tighten limits on tailpipe emissions to encourage automakers to sell   
   more nonpolluting electric vehicles. (Restrictions on other pollutants from   
      
   [continued in next message]   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)